A Twitter campaign is outing people who marched with white nationalists in Charlottesville

A campaign to identify the marchers spread on social media following the bloody right-wing rally in Charlottesville. (Thomas Johnson/The Washington Post)

A campaign to name and shame people who marched at a bloody right-wing rally in Charlottesville has so far prompted two universities to condemn white supremacy — even as the outed students defend their decisions to attend.

Not everyone who went to the weekend rallies was a student, of course. Hundreds of people from all walks of life joined neo-Nazis, Ku Klux Klan members and white nationalists for a weekend event dubbed “Unite the Right.”

As marches and countermarches devolved into violence — culminating Saturday when a man rammed his car into a crowd and killed a woman — the Twitter user @YesYoureRacist asked for help identifying “Nazis marching in Charlottesville.”

The anonymous user linked to copious photos and videos of the rally — swastikas and crowds of shouting white men.

Within minutes, names began to pour in, and consequences began to unfurl in home towns across the country.

These arguments apparently didn’t sit well with the University of Nevada, where Cvjetanovic also works on campus.

“The University unequivocally rejects the positions and ideology that were espoused during the white supremacist rally that occurred in Charlottesville, Virginia,” school President Marc Johnson wrote in a statement late Monday.

But, Johnson wrote, “based on discussion and investigation with law enforcement, our attorneys and our Office of Student Conduct, there is no constitutional or legal reason to expel him from our University or to terminate his employment.”

“These last few days have turned into a disaster,” Cvjetanovic told ABC affiliate KOLO. But, he said, “I believe that cultures are being threatened. … Everyone is melding together.”

Cvjetanovic was infamous on campus for that kind of talk, according to Ed Donofrio, a self-described socialist who told The Post he used to share a dorm suite with the white nationalist.

“I remember having a discussion with him one time about the whole build-the-wall thing,” Donofrio said, referring to President Trump’s plan to wall off the border with Mexico. “He was a fan of shooting immigrants coming across.”

The shaming campaign claimed some innocent casualties along with avowed white nationalists. @YoureARacist apologized after claiming YouTube star Joey Salads went to the rally with a Nazi armband. (Salads wore the armband months earlier at a Donald Trump rally, as an experiment, apparently.)

And as the New York Times reported, the campaign sprawled beyond a single Twitter account, leading errant sleuths across the Internet to call for the firing of a University of Arkansas worker who was misidentified as a marcher who looked vaguely similar.

Another rally-goer being shamed on Twitter didn’t actually need to be outed, as he had announced his attendance and live-streamed the event for his fans.

All the same, James Allsup’s presence in Virginia caused a scandal back home at his school, Washington State University.

The school’s president first released a statement condemning “racism and Nazism of any kind,” then an open letter denouncing the rally for surfacing “the most vile and dehumanizing beliefs and actions of human history.”

White nationalists, met by counterprotesters, held a Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville after torch-bearing protesters marched through the University of Virginia campus the night before. During the rally, a vehicle plowed into a crowd marching peacefully through downtown Charlottesville.

Caption

White nationalists, met by counterprotesters, held a Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville after torch-bearing protesters marched through the University of Virginia campus the night before. During the rally, a vehicle plowed into a crowd marching peacefully through downtown Charlottesville.